1、1Bock to School,Back on Their FeetHE violent earthquake that ripped through Wenchuan three years ago caught schoolchildren amid their lessons in packed classrooms.Falling ceilings and collapsing floorsensured many didnt make it out,and the few who did make narrow escapes were leftwith lasting wounds
2、 to their bodies,hearts and minds. The losses and woes of local children drew the attention and sympathy of the nation.Six daysafter the disaster the China Youth Development Foundation set up the first Post-quake Schoolof Hope in Zundao Town,Mianzhu City,in the epicenter area.Now more than 3,oo0 sch
3、oolshave been rebuilt in the province,buttressing the sense of recovery everyone in academic circlesis struggling to feel while still torn between remembering and forgetting.Wisdom beyond Her Years Li Lu,a 17-year-old,smiles fromher wheelchair at the back of the class.She was assigned the seat for i
4、ts easyaccess to the rear door.Li was a sev-enth grader at Juyuan Middle Schoolin Dujiangyan City at the time of the2008 earthquake,which killed 283of her schoolmates.Pulled out of therubble six hours later,she kept her lifebut lost her right 2arm and right leg.The intervening years have healed herp
5、hysically and psychologically.Thoughbashful toward reporters,she is kuown among her friendsas a happy,confident girl who lifts the spirits of otherswith her jokes and pranks. Li Lu feels she is tougher than she was before the disas-ter.“After a brush with death you will find there is noth-ing much l
6、eft to be afraid of,“ she confided.Eager to showshe is not consumed by self-pity,the petite teenager haslearnt to write and do daily chores with her left hand.Nowshe uses it to write and to draw cartoons that are way betterthan most kids her age could produce. Li Lu plans to study cartoon art in col
7、lege in Beijing orChengdu,the provincial capital.Now in the first year of se-nior high school,she feels the mounting pressure to study,but presses on with plan to provide her parents a betterlife someday.She never realized how much her mom,adustwoman,and her dad,a pedicab rider,would do forher until
8、 she was faced with this enormous adversity threeyears ago.Almost overnight she learnt to be grateful forwhat she formerly took for granted and developed a senseof obligation to repay others. “When buried in the rubble,I remembered my dad hadalways wanted to go to Australia,and told myself I wouldma
9、ke his dream 3come true if I could just get out of therealive,“ Liu recalled.“Thats the only wish I had on the vergeof death.“ Earthquakes are a maturing experi-ence for their victims.For instance,she now thinks further into her future,malting plans not only for the comingmonths,but for years and ev
10、en de-cades ahead.“The world is so big,andI havent seen much of it.I will go asfar as I can.“ Thats the vision that ear-rles her. An End to Segregation By June 2009,after one year ofrelocation in Rizhao,Shandong Prov- ince,the 625 quake orphans were backin Sichuan and settled into Tanghu Primary Sch
11、ool,one ofthe best in Chengdu.The faculty took them in their armscompassionately,which treatment naturally transformedinto extending privileges to their young charges.The resultswere not ideal. Huang Hu is the head teacher of Class Nine of Grade Six,whose 64 students are all quake orphans.“I got a h
12、eadacheeveryday in the first weeks of having them in my class,“ herecalled.“They were silent,alwayswith heads bowed 4low,and hardlylistening to tny lectures.“ Huang andanother teacher concluded that itwould do more harm than good tolavish extra attention on the orphansand give them the impression th
13、eywere different.The school began tointegrate them with other studentsin regular classes and after schoolactivities,and improvement waspalpable.Now the quake orphansare the group that breaks the largestnumber of new records in the schools sports activities andgives the best performances during honor
14、 guard training.The communat life,eating and sleeping in groups of theirpeers for three years,has helped them develop greater forti-tude,stronger discipline and better teamwork skills. All the quake orphans belong to the schools variousstudents organizations.Twelve of them are in the choir,in-cludin
15、g Ding Siyu.“Ding was tightly clamped up in her ownworld at first,“ said Lei Zhaoli,the choir supervisor.“Shespoke very little.Whatever you asked her,her only replywas I dont know. But when she took part in the singing,.for the first time a smile flashed across her face.“ Now thislittle girl is comp
16、letely different,associating with peoplearound her with ease and confidence.“I can see she ishappy.Sometimes she volunteers to be the organizer of herteam,or offers to collect papers for me.I dont have to 5harpa litany ofshoulds and should nots, as art itself is a potenttool of education,“ the teach
17、er said. A More Meaningful Life Xuankou Middle School was reduced to dust during theearthquake.When PLA soldiers rushed to the site,theywere astonished by the sight of Liu Yanyan,a history teach-er,instructing her class to dig up potatoes from the rubblefor dinner,pitch tents with materials availabl
18、e and sing thenational anthem in the process.These acts helped sustaintheir hopes for survival in a time of sheer numbness andconfusion. Now Ms.Liu teaches in July 1 Middle School in YingxiuTown,a school built with donations by CPC membersacross the nation.The location,a level site by the MinjiangRi
19、ver,was selected after a careful survey.The design givestop priority to safety.“The school building has several stair-ways that are broad and slightly inclined,making it possiblefor swift and smooth evacuation in emergency situations,“Liu said.She also takes pride in the sehooIs rubberized jog-ging
20、track,the seeund one laid in the area. 6The past three years have also seen profound changes in her personal life: marriage and having a baby are two ofthem.An expressway was built between the town and Du-jianyan,where her family lives,cutting the journey timeto 16 minutes.The old road wound across
21、a mountain andhad lots of hairpin bends that caused ear accidents.Ivis-ited nay family only once a week in thoseyears.“ The pupils Liu tutored in 2oo8 were intheir last year of junior high school.Somecontinued their education,and othersjoined the work force. On her graduation Wang Sha,now 18,went to
22、 Guangdong Province for threeyears vocational training.She now worksas a tour guide in Yingxiu.“I person-ally lived through the quake and have afirsthand story to tell my tour groups.Nobody can do a better job than me,“ thegirl chucklded. She keeps her tale on a positive note,recounting thisdeadly piece of her past in matter-of-fact terms: “The earth-quake was a catastrophe,but it taught us a lot.Since I amone of the lucky ones who survived,I am obliged to do moremeaningful things for society. “
